*WASHINGTON — Just days before the presidential inauguration and Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. holiday, broadcasterTavis Smiley is bringing together a bipartisan dream team to discuss the creation of a national plan to cut poverty in half in 10 years and eradicate it in 25. With the call for a national White House Conference on the Eradication of Poverty in America, Smiley and the panelists ask for a laser-like focus on the lives of 50 million Americans living in poverty on the brink of despair.

NNU Executive Director, RoseAnn DeMoro

Be sure to watch RoseAnn DeMoro, National Nurses United’s executive director, talk Thursday about how bedside nurses are witnessing the devastating harm the economy has on patients and their communities.

She will join other speakers in the nationally-televised conversation -- “Vision for a New America: A Future Without Poverty” -- hosted by Tavis Smiley, a talk show host, author and advocate.

HOW TO PARTICIPATE:

Tune in and Share: “Vision for a New America: A Future Without Poverty”Thursday, January 17 at 6:30 p.m. ET.

The participants, who include Dr. Cornel West, Marcia Fudge, educator Jonathan Kozol and Prof. Jeffrey Sachs, will discuss their perspectives on poverty and share solutions to America’s declining condition.

DeMoro will give details on the Robin Hood Tax, a sales tax on Wall Street speculative trading, that can raise billions to fund social programs for people in poverty and start healing communities in need. The tax is embodied in The Inclusive Prosperity Act, sponsored by Rep. Keith Ellison (D-MN) and now with 16 co-sponsors. To learn more about the Robin Hood Tax, go to www.robinhodtax.org

“Millions of American families are still hurting as a result of the financial collapse in 2008,” said DeMoro. “Unlike the banks that were bailed out, and the 1% who continue to amass enormous wealth, vast numbers of Americans have had no recovery. Our nurses share stories every day about demise in communities. People are sick and dying because of this grossly unequal economy.”

The broadcast will take place at George Washington University, Lisner Auditorium, 730 21st St. NW, Washington, D.C. Panelists will sign, together on stage, an online petition calling for a White House Conference on U.S. Poverty.

“America is teetering on cliffs and bumping against ceilings,” said Smiley. “This is no way to run a country. Together, we can devise a plan of attack to fight poverty in America. Ignoring this moral issue is an abomination.”

In addition to DeMoro, the panelists are Newt Gingrich, former Speaker of the House of Representatives; Representative Marcia L. Fudge (D-OH), chair of the Congressional Black Caucus; John D. Graham, dean, Indiana University School of Public & Environmental Affairs and author of America’s Poor and the Great Recession; Jonathan Kozol, author of Fire in the Ashes: Twenty-Five Years Among the Poorest Children in America; Mariana Chilton, director for the Center for Hunger-Free Communities and associate professor of Drexel University School of Public Health; Jeffrey Sachs, director of the Earth Institute at Columbia University; Cornel West, Union Theological Seminary Professor and author.